In Interview, Revealed That They Sold Enough Shares to Fulfill the Pledge of 'Selling 10% Stake'
Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaking at the Satellite Conference and Exhibition held in Washington on March 9 last year. Photo by AP Yonhap News
[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Heeyoon] Elon Musk, the world's richest person and CEO of Tesla, announced that he has sold enough Tesla shares to fulfill his promise of selling 10% of his holdings.
According to foreign media reports on the 21st (local time), in an interview with the satirical website Babylon Bee, Musk said, "Including exercised stock options, I have sold enough shares to reach 10%."
On the 6th of last month, Musk posted on Twitter asking whether he would sell 10% of his Tesla holdings, and subsequently sold 12.9 million shares to cover taxes from stock options, raising $13.6 billion (approximately 16.218 trillion KRW). It is known that Musk exercised stock options for a total of 17 million shares during this period.
On this day as well, Musk exercised rights for 2 million stock options and sold an additional 583,611 shares.
On the 19th, Musk stated on Twitter that he would pay over $11 billion (approximately 13.1 trillion KRW) in taxes this year.
The U.S. investment media MarketWatch observed that since the tweet last month, Musk sold 13.5 million shares but received 16.4 million shares through stock options exercisable at $6.24 per share, suggesting that his actual Tesla holdings may have increased.
Meanwhile, Tesla's stock price has fallen 24% since Musk's tweet about selling 10% of his shares.
Earlier, in response to investigative media ProPublica's claim in June that Musk was paying less income tax relative to his wealth, Musk rebutted that he does not receive a salary from Tesla or space company SpaceX, and that he pays taxes on exercised stock options at an effective rate of 53%.
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